This specification relates to electromagnetic communications and more particularly to performance testing used for contactless communication.
Advances in semiconductor manufacturing and circuit design technologies have enabled the development and production of integrated circuits (ICs) with increasingly higher operational frequencies. In turn, electronic products and systems incorporating high frequency integrated circuits provide greater functionality than previous generations of products. The additional functionality has typically included the processing of increasingly larger amounts of data at increasingly higher speeds.
Conventional testing typically employs automatic test equipment (“ATE”) to perform one or more tests on a device or component, referred to as a device under test (“DUT”). ATE is typically used to test electronic components and systems after being fabricated. Conventional ATE can automatically perform tests and evaluate results, which can reduce the time needed to test components at various stages of production (e.g., die level, package level, module level, and prior to assembly in a final product or prior to sale). However, conventional ATE capable of testing both signal integrity (e.g., RF performance) requiring a continuous wave signal and jitter requiring a modulated signal at the same time, e.g., in a single insertion, seems to be non-existent, or if it does exist, it may not be widely available or cost effective. This drawback of conventional ATE can be exacerbated when testing extremely high frequency communications, e.g., 60 GHz, components because it would typically require up/down converters and modulated signal sources at the same time.